Massey Energy is in “a standoff” with federal investigators trying to determine responsibility for the deaths of 29 Massey miners earlier this year. The mining company won’t comply with inspections of equipment defects which may have doomed the miners, and doesn’t the showdown highlight the corporate personhood fallacy? Imagine a serial murderer successfully disallowing police access to a 29-body crime scene. Would the media call that a standoff? Apparently now the mass-murdering Massey has been given an extension until Friday to comply. Can real-persons get some of that soft-on-crime-fighting? Aspiring Masons and Gacys, you must incorporate.
Tag Archives: Massey Energy
Don Blankenship Massey Energy thug
Think these coal goons care about trashing the earth, killing miners, or intimidating jurors? Here’s a mob boss doing his own strong-arming: threatens, assaults cameraman. Don Blankenship, he’s not just the president, he’s a front line thug: “If you’re going to start taking pictures of me you’re liable to get shot.”
Cold not coal fells Bee Tree treesitters
Activists Amber Nitchman and Eric Blevins, who brought a halt to Massey Energy’s mountaintop removal blasting of West Virginia’s Coal River Mountain, have been forced down by the cold. Bail and expenses exceed $6,000, contact Climate Ground Zero if you can help.
Mountaintop removal halted into DAY 8
As you come in from the cold spell, think of the Coal River Mountain tree-sitters who are passing their seventh night in drizzling cold, getting by with just what they could pack in the first day, their support crews arrested, their trees now blockaded by fences. Attempts to resupply their brave squats have been intercepted, yesterday Ben Fiorillo was arrested, this morning, David Baghdadi. A flyover today yielded great photos, but no means of reaching the sitters with food, water, heat, batteries or ear protection against the high decibel air horns with which the coal mine security men have been harassing the activists. If you can conjure any alternatives for support, contact Climate Ground Zero. The good news: calls from internet supporters have persuaded West Virginia authorities to temper their aggressive counter-eco-insurgency tactics, and thus far Massey Energy has been prevented from blasting in its Mountaintop Removal efforts because of the treesit presence.
I was hoping to provide some insight into the logistics of manning a treesit. So far I’ve not found much available by way of tutorials online, except for a slim pamphlet (PDF) from Reach Out Publications, and great video instructions for cooking in a tree: Buck’s Canopy Cooking.
One reason perhaps is the need to keep the adversaries in the dark. Another very good reason might be that treesitting skills might be best taught like any skill labor, from journeyman to apprentice. Suffice it to say, treesits are 90% about tree climbing. Hence the majority of your focus will be rope skills. Experts recommend these two titles: The Tree Climbers Companion by Jeff Jepson, and On Rope: North American Vertical Rope Techniques
by Bruce Smith and Allen Padgett.
The complexity of climbing should not stop anyone who’s determined to save our wilderness from the industrial rapists. If extreme sport is your thing, why not look into thrills which go beyond your own adrenalin levels? You want to support the troops? These are our troops. Can you think of any braver?
DAY 5 Coal River Mountain Treesit
CLIMATE GROUND ZERO activist enter their fifth day of their treesit against Massey Energy’s mountaintop removal operations at Coal River Mountain. Tree-sitters David Aaron Smith, Amber Nitchman and Eric Blevins are going strong despite efforts by mine operators to disrupt their perches 60ft above. Support crew Josh Graupera and Isabelle Rozendaal were arrested for trespass and then released on bond; Josh has the latest update on the Bee Tree site. Get involved here.
UPDATE: David Aaron Smith is now in police custody. Nitchman and Blevins remain aloft.
Youtube video updates are provided here. And photos from the treesits are viewable here. The Coal River Wind website details the alternatives to coal mining and mountaintop removal.
Treesit halts W. Va mountaintop removal
Mountain Justice activists Laura Steepleton and Nick Stocks continue to occupy trees adjacent Massey Energy’s West Virginia coal mine, preventing further blasting of the Edwight mountaintop removal site. Assistants at the base of the trees were arrested for trespassing, but called back, expected to help the police communicate with the sitters.
Earth First! spokesman Mike Roselle has been visited by State troopers, demanding he command the Coal River Valley treesitters to climb down. Check Climate Ground Zero for updates, where you can leave messages of encouragement.
From Climate Ground Zero:
This is the thirteenth in a series of non-violent direct actions and protests that have brought together Coal River Valley residents, NASA climate scientist James Hansen, students, underground miners, military veterans, concerned citizens and environmentalists from across the nation with the goal of ending mountaintop removal. This is the third protest in two weeks to focus attention on the WV Department of Environmental Protection and their embattled Secretary, Randy Huffman. It also follows days after the leak of DEP biologist Doug Wood’s memo on the scale of environmental degradation caused by mountaintop removal, directly contradicting Huffman’s statements at a senate hearing last June.
UPDATE: DAY FIVE
A flyover of the treesit and adjacent decapitated mount. Audio is radio interview of Massey Energy director explaining that land ownership means you can do whatever you want to it.
Some screen grabs from the video.